Tag: hiptow

Fortunately after a few setbacks including the weather and availability, we were blessed to have a part-time mover help us out that seller had found on craigslist. Roger is a pretty neat guy, from Trinidad who enjoys sailing, is very experienced and isn’t afraid to tackle an issue, our motorless sailboat. On top of that his price was more than reasonable.

So here was the plan, we would hiptow her using our dinghy and a used 9.8 outboard that I purchased for this one purpose, figuring I could resell after and make my money back from the motor.

So the big day arrived. Would everything come together as planned? (insert hysterical laughter) Of course not. After replacing spark plugs along with the upper and lower oil in the Nissan outboard and learning everything I could about this outboard, we could not get the motor to stay on. After spending about 2 hours of frustration we decided to try the 5.0 Tahatsu 2 stroke (no tide pulls out here thank God). Low and behold she worked flawlessly and tirelessly, until…… we ran out of gas.

Roger and I knew better (2 strokes love gas!), the previous owner assured us that the the 2 gallons of gas we had would get us from Cocoa to Titusville without a problem. Never happened! Looking back it was a good experience to learn how to handle these types of situations. Stacey was trailing on land so she bought us some gas and 2stroke oil, waited at the nearest marina and asked someone that was headed out for a day on their boat to bring us the gas. We pulled over to the side of the ICW and set down our anchor while we waited for the saviors. Boat people are a very helpful bunch

After we got going again we did manage to set a our head sail up for while while trying to conserve gas. (We were headed towards another gas shortage). Unfortunately, the wind was against us most of the way, but we did end making it to Titusville!

After a long grueling day of boat towing (Roger took on the brunt in the dinghy for the entire ride) and paying the man for his awesome service and teaching us a few things along the way, we invited him and his girlfriend to dinner and drinks and had a good time getting to know them better

By this time and because we woke up this morning at 4:00 am to make this thing happen we were exhausted. Would you believe it that Roger, this guy from Trinidad that we first met this morning invited to stay at his rental property for the night for free so that we could get home safely the next morning. We took him up on his offer and It was a good decision to stay the night.

Working with Roger was an absolute pleasure. We spoke about family, work, and boats all along the way. We learned much from him and I admire that he was always patient and thorough from the beginning of the trip to the very end. I hope we can continue a long friendship with Roger and his girlfriend Tangy.

With all being said, I must say we were blessed with an honest and very helpful seller. I have heard of many horror stories out there. Fortunately, we never had to experience any of that.

Stay tuned as the adventure continues. We still have to get her home to St. Augustine.
Until next time,
Dennis